


Necessary Research

by startingatmidnight



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, WandaVision (TV)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Humor, In MY WandaVision? It's More Likely Than You'd Think, Written mid-series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-17 14:40:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29227119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/startingatmidnight/pseuds/startingatmidnight
Summary: As they say: when in Rome, watch 'The Big Bang Theory'.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 71





	Necessary Research

Darcy ( _Doctor_ Darcy, she reminds them between chip packets) is the de-facto leader. Monica runs the table when it comes to S.W.O.R.D meetings, and Jimmy runs the softball team back at Quantico, but Darcy runs the Sitcom Research Department.

Monica wishes S.W.O.R.D had taken the initiative to create this department a few decades ago. It would have saved a lot of time. 

Logistics are difficult inside the SRD (“Like ‘S.W.O.R.D but stupider,” Jimmy laments after a long night of research). Due to the need to keep the Westfield Anomaly away from the public, the only people on staff at the base are those deemed _absolutely necessary_ to the effort. Unfortunately, this means that every time the SRD needs to source a new show, the same song and dance happens. Either they have to find _someone_ who can be spared for longer than an hour to go find the nearest physical box set, or they have to submit a clearance form longer than Darcy’s marching-soldier collection of discarded coffee cups to get permission to illegally torrent it. 

Strictly speaking, the SRD also isn’t a ‘department’, more of a film club that Darcy put together after Monica admitted to not knowing a damn thing about ‘I Love Lucy’, so this piles even more logistical challenges on top of the already-considerable logistical challenges. 

Eventually, Darcy orders half a dozen Amazon packages directly to the site. Director Hayward threatens to eject her, Darcy reminds him who figured out the nature of the anomaly in the first place, and half an hour later, the SRD receives carte blanche to torrent whatever the hell they want. The doctor returns from her dressing-down as unflappable as ever, dropping back in front of her CRT.

“You’re a genius,” Jimmy observes. Monica doesn’t want to create any kind of future nightmare for herself by tacitly approving of going against S.W.O.R.D orders, but she _does_ hand Darcy another bag of chips.

“Saved us time,” Darcy shrugs, one eyebrow raising modestly. She pops the bag open. “Oh man, is Vision stuck up a tree _again_?”

So that solidifies the SRD. Or ‘surd’, as Darcy’s taken to calling it. Jimmy calls it by each letter individually, as all good FBI agents are taught to do. Monica doesn’t call it by anything at all, because the SRD is basically Darcy’s excuse for organising a cross-governmental media club, and there’s too many acronyms on base already. 

In all fairness, it’s a smart choice. Westview’s laws are sitcom laws. Watching sitcoms gives the department an opportunity to get familiar with the tropes they’re handling before they try anything out on Westview.

Or, that was the plan at first. It only took a couple nights of diligent note-taking over episodes of “I Dream of Jeannie” before Monica was so deeply disturbed that she demanded an episode of ‘Friends’ just to break things up. Then the ‘SRD’ just became a nightly excuse to watch stupid TV. Monica’s really hoping Wanda doesn’t get to the nineties anytime soon, or half of her comfort shows are going to become unwatchable.

Speaking of the unwatchable, tonight’s “necessary research” is The Big Bang Theory. If Wanda starts plagiarising _that_ , Monica’s finding herself a new posting. They’re watching on Darcy’s laptop, crowded together on Darcy’s bunk, because the SRD has funding issues. There’s no alcohol on base for drinking games, but Jimmy’s got Tic-Tacs, so they aim one at Sheldon every time he says ‘Bazinga’. 

Jimmy’s the undefeated champ. Monica’s a couple dozen Tic-Tacs behind. Darcy’s lucky if she hits the screen at all.

“What I don’t get,” Jimmy says, flicking a name card from hand to hand, “Is why laugh tracks are even a thing anyway.”

“Hate to break it to ya,” Darcy says, “But this is a live studio audience.”

Jimmy hasn’t looked this disconcerted since WandaVision’s Thanksgiving episode. “You’re _kidding._ There are real people laughing at this?” He shivers. "Oh god, if Wanda does Big Bang Theory..."

“If WandaVision makes it to the late noughties,” Monica says without feeling, “We nuke the entire site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.”

Darcy tips her coffee mug at Monica in salute. “Respect the reference. Don’t think nukes would work. Appreciate the chutzpah.”

“Why wouldn’t nukes work?” Jimmy asks, frowning. Darcy shrugs.

“I don’t know. The lady in the department said so. _Astro_ physicist, not nuclear. Ask me how redshift works and I’ll tell you.”

“How does redshift work?”

“Dude, boring question.” Darcy sips her coffee. “You get the feeling nobody who worked on Big Bang Theory ever spoke to anyone with a PhD?”

Monica snorts. “They do kinda act like having a doctorate is a magical portal to being a super genius.”

“As someone with a doctorate _in_ magical portals, I resent that. But true.”

Jimmy flips his FBI name card in mid-air and catches it. “As someone with an online diploma in close-up magic, I also resent that.”

Monica frowns. “Did you just say that to show off that you know sleight of hand magic?”

“Hey, Darcy, your doctorate’s in magical portals?”

Monica looks at Jimmy pointedly. “Don’t avoid the question.”

Jimmy avoids eye contact. Monica makes a pact that when this is all over, she’s going to find Jimmy’s magic diploma and print it out on a “We Survived The Westview Anomaly” shirt. If they survive the Westview Anomaly. Monica needs to work on that part first. Not tonight, though. She is so sick and tired of anomalies.

Darcy lowers the show’s volume and sits up straight. “Okay, so you guys know Thor, right?”

Jimmy raises an eyebrow. “I mean, not _physically_. I mean, not… No. We haven’t met. In person. I’ve seen him on TV. Why do you ask?”

“Well,” Darcy says, tipping her travel mug from side to side, “One time my friend ran him over with a camper van.”

Monica snorts. Since the last decade of insanity, there’s _always_ an Avengers story with civilian personnel on military bases. She loves to hear them. Not that she tells her own, but that’s her business. You have to keep something to yourself in this line of work, or you end up eaten alive by it. She shifts so she can’t see the sitcom anymore, sitting cross-legged on the scratchy regulation blanket.

“Okay, call me invested.”

Jimmy pockets his card, shuffling up so Monica has room to put her knees flush to the bed. He’s blinking rapid-fire. “ _You ran Thor over?_ ”

“I mean, it’s nothing you can’t find in my file,” Darcy says, with a wry tone that implies her file is all bullshit, “But yeah, pretty much. Anyway. My friend dated him for a while, broke up with him. Hit him with the van again. Not in that order, she hit him with the van after she ran him over but before the dating. Anyway, we ran him over _because_ he magic-portalled right into the van. Talk about car accidents changing your life.”

Monica blinks, trying to put the events together in her head. Darcy tells stories in an order that breaks her brain.

“Your friend ran over an Avenger so… you authored a doctoral paper about it?”

Darcy shrugs. “Inspiration’s gotta come from somewhere, you know?” 

“Magic-portalled,” Jimmy says, frowning. “You mean London?”

Darcy grins, salutes Jimmy with the coffee mug. “ _Also_ us, but that was post-dating, pre-breakup, pre-van and pre-other van. Also back then I studied poli-sci, but back then Thor was also the only alien on earth, so. New era, new field of study, y’know.” She sits back and shrugs. “Anyway, that’s _my_ story.”

Monica’s not going to correct her on the number of aliens on Earth. She golf-claps the story, nodding with respect.

“Gotta say, Doctor Lewis, that’s a new one on me, so congrats. Never heard of anyone T-boning an Avenger before. You claim insurance on that?”

Darcy smirks. “Nah. He was easier to mush back then.”

Mildly worrying. Does Thor get stronger with time or something? Monica files the info away for another time. She turns to Jimmy.

“What about you, FBI? You weren't all that fazed by the metaphysical.”

Jimmy smiles. “Well… You spend a few years as Ant-Man’s parole officer and you get used to the weird stuff. A guy who can shrink to the size of a dime isn’t easy to keep at home, believe you me.”

Darcy raises an eyebrow. “So he can’t go to the size of an ant?” She looks at the middle-distance that is The Big Bang Theory, and shrugs. “Guess Dime-Guy would be lame,” she concedes.

Jimmy grimaces. “Look, I _used_ to say ‘size of an ant’, but I had to check his house after the Blip, and, uh. Ant size is kind of a flexible measurement, for me, now. There was a big ant.” He pauses. “It was playing drums. I left for the Connecticut office same-day.” He sighs. “Never got my deposit back on the apartment.”

Monica’s not sure if giant ant trauma is more or less stupid than hitting the god of thunder with an RV. She’s learned not to trivialise stupid-sounding stories about enhanced beings, though. Former one-time sitcom characters don’t get to throw stones in glass houses. 

Okay, maybe one stone. She’s earned one stone.

“Wow,” Monica says, dutifully throwing a Tic-Tac at the screen as Sheldon says the magic word, “I didn’t know I was sitting with Avengers royalty. You two should write a ‘It Could Happen To You’ article.”

Jimmy glares, looking halfway to offended. “Okay, what about you, then?”

Monica offers a well-practised shrug. “You grow up in S.W.O.R.D headquarters, you get used to crazy after a while.”

She doesn’t miss the brief incredulous glance that passes between her fellow department members. She pretends to miss it.

“All right then,” Darcy says, “Keep your secrets.”

“Nice reference,” Monica concedes. To her relief, neither Jimmy nor Darcy try to push her for more, and they settle down into what passes for contented silence when you’re watching ‘The Big Bang Theory’ on a laptop screen next door to a town trapped in a reality-bending sitcom bubble. Monica pulls one knee to her chest and stares at the screen. The laugh track blisters in her ears. She remembers the emptiness in her head when she said her name was Geraldine.

“We should watch Lord of the Rings,” Jimmy interjects suddenly. “It’s not like we’re learning anything about the anomaly watching this.”

Monica picks her head up. “Original or extended?”

“Oh my god,” Darcy groans. “Everywhere I go, I’m surrounded by nerds.”

“You made the reference,” Monica says. She taps the escape key until Sheldon is well and truly gone. “And I’m gonna bet― a- _ha_!”

“Dude,” Darcy says, sounding legitimately horrified for once, “You checked my ‘Porn’ folder _first_?”

"Obviously."

“Nobody labels their porn as porn,” Jimmy agrees with conviction. Monica makes a mental note to check later that Jimmy’s not going to get their torrenting permissions revoked. For now, she clicks the first of the .mov files neatly labelled as the Lord of the Rings Extended Editions, one through three.

“Sitcoms are dumb anyway,” Monica says.

“As head of ‘surd’―”

“S-R-D―”

“―Why’d we even name it―”

“― _Whatever_ ― I officially concur. Sitcoms are dumb. I authorise you to do your nerd thing, Captain Rambeau.”

“Yes, ma’am, Doctor Lewis,” Monica says.

For the first time since she arrived in New Jersey, Monica doesn’t feel a thrill of dread when a title screen starts up. She smiles and settles back against the flimsy corrugated wall besides Darcy’s bunk.

“Okay, not to bring up WandaVision when we’re like, not doing that right now,” Darcy says, “But you know the episode where Vision figures out he can instantaneously cook a turkey by slapping it at five thousand kilometers an hour?”

Jimmy shudders. “I don’t even wanna know how you’re gonna relate that to this.”

“Well―”

The SRD hunkers down for what Jimmy will later claim as, after they’re all two hours late to clock in the next morning, ‘necessary research’. It is the only time the department ever comes in useful at the Westview Anomaly. Darcy is removed from a meeting for saying ‘bazinga’. Monica isn’t sure how they’ve collectively survived this long.

**Author's Note:**

> If Vision doesn't absolutely decimate something with his super speed bitch slap before the end of the show then I'm cancelling my Disney+ subscription


End file.
